diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index eb8149fd..f85fe655 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -1,3 +1,7 @@
+## 7.16.1 (unreleased)
+### Implementation changes and bug fixes
+- [PR #1252](https://github.com/rqlite/rqlite/pull/1252): Stop the HTTP server first on shutdown.
+
 ## 7.16.0 (May 5th 2023)
 ### New features
 - [PR #1243](https://github.com/rqlite/rqlite/pull/1243): Support automatically restoring from AWS S3. Thanks to [VOXO](https://voxo.co/) for funding this development.
diff --git a/cmd/rqlited/main.go b/cmd/rqlited/main.go
index dedfb0f0..b9fa02bc 100644
--- a/cmd/rqlited/main.go
+++ b/cmd/rqlited/main.go
@@ -194,6 +194,10 @@ func main() {
 	signal.Notify(terminate, syscall.SIGINT, syscall.SIGTERM, os.Interrupt)
 	<-terminate
 
+	// Stop the HTTP server first, so clients get notification as soon as
+	// possible that the node is going away.
+	httpServ.Close()
+
 	if cfg.RaftStepdownOnShutdown {
 		if str.IsLeader() {
 			// Don't log a confusing message if not (probably) Leader
@@ -204,7 +208,6 @@ func main() {
 	}
 
 	backupSrvCancel()
-	httpServ.Close()
 	if err := str.Close(true); err != nil {
 		log.Printf("failed to close store: %s", err.Error())
 	}